Sweet Relief
by Rick K'Tish
Summary: When the inevitable begins to occur, Midoriya knows how to help out. Living alone with a single mother numbs one to such discomforts as these. Warning: discussion of menstruation. Where's the slice-of-life genre?


When the inevitable begins to occur, Midoriya knows how to help out. Living alone with a single mother numbs one to such discomforts as these.

Every one of the girls is a little bit different. Of course they are; no two girls are the same, after all, especially during that time of the month.

Ashido has a lot of nausea and bloating discomfort, as well as period poop, and basically just a lot of gastrointestinal distress. She's a tampon girl and has to change it out regularly because her acid also goes a little haywire, especially down there, and the tampon begins to dissolve pretty soon, though pads are worse because they dissolve faster.

Tsu has one day of bad cramps and period fever, which concerns the others, but she explains it has something to do with her conflicting human-frog biology and they leave her alone about it. The rest of the time she's fine. She's a pads girl and has a really light flow, so she basically just uses a light pad all the way through.

Uraraka also has a lot of nausea and some mood stuff but is mostly normal. She only uses night pads though because of trauma involving sitting all day at a desk with an improperly placed pad. She tries to avoid floating herself while on her period and if she's going to she'll use a tampon instead that day.

Jirou has the worst cramps in the world. She throws up not from nausea, though she gets that too, but from simple constriction. She's pale constantly and basically doesn't want to move. She also becomes basically lactose intolerant during her period and ends up drinking a lot of chocolate soy milk. She uses nothing but night pads as well, but she has to change them way often because her flow is extraordinarily heavy.

Hagakure is the awful cryptid whose cycle only lasts three days. It stretches to four when she syncs with everyone, but still. She also gets a lot of aches and pains in her joints and sometimes gets gassy, with mild mood disruption— she's slightly more sensitive to things. She prefers tampons, but since her blood is also invisible, she sometimes uses a pad and just goes regular stark naked for exercises. She always takes some time showering afterward though.

Yaoyorozu is the one everyone is syncing to because she's had hers the longest, and she has cramps, heavy bleeding, and really uncomfortable bloating and some nausea. She also becomes somewhat weepy. She alternates pads and tampons, less comfortable with pads but also afraid of toxic shock syndrome. She never uses a tampon for more than two hours, so she goes through those pretty fast, but she'll use a pad for as long as she can go without moving on her worst days.

Midoriya has always been the guy who carries both tampons and pads in case his friends need a little something during the school day. He's lived with a single mother as long as he can remember, and mama Midoriya's time of the month has never been kind. When the news comes that they'll be moving into dorms, Izuku finishes packing his all might merch and other memorabilia and then promptly tells his mom he's running to the store for medical supplies. She asks why and then he explains that he doesn't want the girls to be alone and unprepared when they start syncing up; he remembers a time before life got in the way when Bakugou's mom came over regularly for a long time and they ended up being synced; he doesn't want to be unprepared for when the girls begin to suffer. Mama Midoriya begins to cry about how precious her son is and then goes with him to help him carry all the things.

The boys are all confused when Midoriya shows up to move into the dorms with a box labeled "DO NOT TOUCH UNLESS EXPRESSLY GIVEN PERMISSION;" they all want to know what's inside, but also they kind of don't dare because Midoriya is scary when he's serious. So they leave it alone and it taunts them for a while.

And then the day comes.

The first month they're in the dorms, the girls disappear at different times. They hide in their rooms, they don't really talk to anyone much, and they don't discuss Midoriya showing up knocking on the door in the middle of the night with supplies and comfort and a question of whether there's anything else they need. They're all a little too embarrassed to accept the offer, but he reminds them that it's always available if they need it. Tsu is the only exception. After her one day of misery, she approaches him and thanks him, though even her straightforwardness isn't enough to clue others in really.

The second month divides the girls into who they mostly spend time with. Hagakure and Ashido disappear first, with Jirou following only a couple of days behind, and about four days later Yaoyorozu goes down, followed three days after by Uraraka and Tsu on the same day. Again, Midoriya shows up in the middle of the night with supplies and asking about what they need. This time he manages to catch Ashido and Hagakure together, commiserating together at two in the morning, and after a moment of internal debate in both of them, they hesitantly ask him to bring yogurt for Ashido and ice cream for Hagakure if he can. He says he'll see what he can find and asks about flavor requests and Hagakure sheepishly says chocolate ice cream and Ashido says really any kind of yogurt will do since it's more a texture request; it's the only thing she can think of that doesn't make her cringe to think about swallowing. They're stunned when he manages to come back with not only the chocolate ice cream but also chocolate yogurt. He asks if there's anything else he can do to help and they say no, but thank you a million times. He nods and says if they need anything they know where his room is.

The second month also has him convincing Yaoyorozu to let him bring her a heat pack for her cramps and getting Tsu and Uraraka both to let him brush their hair while they're being miserable. Tsu appreciates the distraction from her one day of cramps and also the brush feels good because when she gets fevers her scalp gets tingly from the temperature; the brush scraping against the tingly heat is somehow very soothing even as her body is wracked with chills. Uraraka spends the whole time he's brushing her hair ranting and crying about something and he listens and hums and affirms and squeezes her shoulder comfortingly at all the right places. He also brings her chocolate ice cream and that just makes it even better.

Jirou he catches at a time when she's so nauseous she can't even speak and is just lying in her room crying, clutching her stomach and trying not to vomit. He brings a clean trash can that doesn't smell— an enormous blessing because her olfactory sensitivity skyrockets during this time— and a lot of heat packs. He puts them on her stomach, side, and back, covering the whole of her pain area in blessed heat, and stays with her to replace them as needed. It takes a good hour for her to be able to relax enough to say thanks, and he just waves her off. He also brings her a few water bottles— magnificent because she can drink them without spilling or moving— and even a box drink of coconut water just in case she wants something sweet. He stays until she drifts off to sleep and in the morning when she wakes not well rested but not absolutely exhausted either and fortunately mobile, she goes to the fridge and finds an entire carton of chocolate soy milk with her name literally written on it in Midoriya's hasty scrawl. The boy is a godsend and when she approaches Uraraka later about it later during her own time, the round-faced girl begins to cry about how precious their sweet broccoli boi is and how kind and compassionate and Jirou doesn't do other people crying very well so she gives an awkward but agreeable pat on the shoulder and backs the heck out before the tears can get any worse.

It's in the third month that they all somehow manage to start within the same week. This time Jirou is somehow first, starting Monday morning, and by Tuesday evening Hagakure has joined her. Ashido starts sometime in the night from Tuesday to Wednesday and Thursday brings down Yaoyorozu and Uraraka together. Tsu joins the misery early Friday morning and by Friday evening they're all a mess.

They congregate on the common room couch and turn on Netflix to try and find a good distraction but they're all kind of just miserable. The boys have been whispering among themselves, slightly panicking at the apparent illness sweeping the girls' dorms so suddenly. They stay longer at training Friday afternoon, partly because Bakugou initiates a fighting ring and none of the boys want to miss it going down, either out of eagerness to smash each others' faces in or out of concern for those who would be doing and receiving the smashing, and partly because none of them want to have to deal with the miserable girls. When they come into the dorms they're all loud and rowdy for barely a moment before Kaminari sees the woeful group on the couch and freezes, drawing the attention of the other boys enough that they all go relatively quiet.

Since most teenage boys never quite learn the difference between a woman's pained expression and her irritated one, they all tiptoe around getting themselves food from the kitchen behind the couch, frozen in terror at the thought of setting one of the girls off while they're sick and getting infected by getting screamed at. The only exceptions are Todoroki, who has no sense of social grace or fear of regular women's' wrath to trigger his caution, and Midoriya who sighs hopelessly at the others' ridiculousness. He waves Todoroki over to him and while the others make food and flee before anything life-threatening can occur, the two of them quietly make snacks and things that will be easy on the girls' bodies, Todoroki moving under Midoriya's direction. They come in with water bottles with straws filled with cold water and a few drops of an electrolyte solution concocted by the school for maintaining healthy balances in highly active heroes and carrying trays of sandwiches cut into eighth triangles and speared on toothpicks, drinks of various kinds with ibuprofen readily accessible, and a promise of hot chocolate when the other drinks are cleared away.

Both Uraraka and Hagakure start crying and thanking the two of them while Ashido and Yaoyorozu look like they might do the same. Tsu just nods and thanks them straightforwardly and Jirou smiles weakly, already extremely pale.

Midoriya goes to get some hot packs for those who need or even just want them and Todoroki stops to see what they're actually watching. It's some remake of an early Disney movie that came out a quarter of a century ago; the main character's quirk allows him to build whatever he wants, but he's selfish and only likes building things for himself. When his evil grandmother uses her quirk— changing people into animals— on him, transforming him into a llama, he has to go on an adventure with a struggling father for whose family he refused to build a better home in order to find someone who can cancel the grandmother's quirk. He thinks he's heard something about it being extremely dissimilar to the original, but it makes for an interesting story regardless. He's only seen it once before when the whole dorm decided to stay up watching old Disney remakes until early light.

They're just getting to the part where the grandmother's servant is revealed to have a dual quirk which may be able to cancel the animal quirk if he uses it correctly when Todoroki hears a pained hiss from Jirou. He looks away from the screen and down at where she's curled near the end of the couch, not leaning against the side out of what is clearly sheer pride and stubbornness, pale and looking like she might be sick to her stomach at any moment. She's clutching her stomach and there are faint tears beginning to escape her eyes.

Todoroki isn't really one for physical contact most of the time. He's awkward and uncomfortable with it, uncertain about what's safe and what's not and what's socially appropriate and what's not, and he generally avoids any kind of opportunity to touch other people unless he's sparring. There is only one exception to this. While Todoroki may not have the experience Midoriya does of having a single mother who has a terrible time all around every month, he _does_ have an older sister he sometimes manages to see when his father isn't home, and for as long as he can remember she's had times where she would randomly grab him and press his left side her waist before sighing in relief. When he was small she would simply pick him up and hold him. Once he got bigger, she would sit with him and have him wrap his arm around her waist.

He knows his left side is warmer than most, and as much as he's avoided using it and training it he is actually capable of regulating his own temperature. So with his usual lack of social grace, he sits down beside Jirou and wraps his left arm around her waist, raising his left side's temperature to what he hopes is a comfortable level.

The quiet murmurs and eating sounds pause for a moment, the movie continuing to play as everyone tries to comprehend what's happening.

Todoroki Shouto is willingly touching someone.

Todoroki Shouto has taken up a casual, and perhaps a rather _friendly_ position with a _girl_.

Todoroki Shouto is watching as the servant debates with the physical manifestations of his quirk— an angel and a devil on either of his shoulders— about whether to continue serving his evil mistress or to help the newly-become-generous grandson by restoring him to his human form.

Jirou is blushing violently, but after thirty seconds of no change, realizes that the heat from the arm wrapped around her and the side pressed against her back is providing the best relief she's ever felt to this horrible condition of the female experience. She nearly begins crying from thankfulness alone but instead squeezes Todoroki's arm gratefully. He doesn't react, and they all slowly go back to just watching the movie in peace.

Midoriya returns a few minutes later and obviously bites his lip to hide a smile at Todoroki's new position as a living heat pack himself. He passes out the ones he brought and collects empty cups to either refill or put away as he starts preparing hot chocolate to help soothe the aches and pains from the inside out and refills a few water bottles while he's at it. The precious innocence of his heterochromatic friend is adorable and touching all at once, and he resists the urge to take pictures, knowing Todoroki wouldn't understand why if he tried. On screen, the grandmother interrupts the Servant's attempts to help and the struggling father's quirk is revealed to be the ability to reflect others' quirks back on them. The evil grandmother is transformed into a cat and cannot transform herself back, and a chase to protect the servant and his quirk from her wrath ensues. Midoriya comes back in just as the movie is ending with hot chocolate and fresh heating packs for all, and Yaoyorozu, having noted Jirou's relief at the hands of their classmate, asks if she can trade places with the other girl if she's feeling okay to do so. Jirou agrees to trade, and takes the heating packs from Midoriya while Yaoyorozu finds herself nearly giddy at the easy way Todoroki circulates the heat from his side and arm to spread to where it's needed in the deeper abdominal muscles the heating packs can never quite reach. It's relief unlike she's ever experienced before, and she suddenly knows that Todoroki has just gone from most popular guy for attractiveness to most popular cuddle partner in class 1-A. He will never escape.

They put on another old Disney remake, this one about a woman who goes against her father's wishes to use her perfect balance quirk to master the sword and join the army rather than sticking to simple flower arrangement and other proper wifely activities. Midoriya remains somehow perfectly aware of when the girls need something and moves quickly and without disrupting the movie each time to get whatever it is. When the movie ends with the woman using her quirk to keep her clumsy commander from tripping and smashing her father's flower pots with his strengthening quirk they have a slight break and shuffle around for the girls to go change their pads and things. Tsu, her cramps just beginning for what will probably last the next 20 hours at least, trades out Yaoyorozu at Todoroki's side. It's Friday night and they start another one, this time about a kindhearted girl with a quirk similar to Koda's that allows her to speak to animals whose aunt goes mad when her transformation quirk is proven insufficient to make her better liked than her niece.

They don't plan to sleep that night, but somehow, after two more movies, with all of them trading out who gets to snuggle Todoroki's warm side and Midoriya carefully providing for their every need, they all drop off at some point and wake sometime around 10:00 Saturday morning.

Somehow during the night they've all migrated and spread out. Hagakure, Ashido and Tsu have all landed themselves on the floor, spread around like they'd been dropped there by an enormous child. Yaoyorozu and Jirou have claimed a second couch off to the side, heads pointed in opposite directions with Jirou's feet tucked under Yaomomo's as though to keep them warm. Todoroki is still on the couch in the same place, but somehow Midoriya wound up in his arms instead of any of the girls, with Uraraka reclined across the freckled boy's lap and shoulder, drooling slightly.

The boys have been up for a few hours, the foolish ones taking pictures and snickering to themselves and the less foolish ones avoiding the common area at all costs, but it doesn't really matter all that much. The worst is over; most of the girls only have a day or so left, and Hagakure is actually done all together. Only Yaomomo and Tsu are still having really bad symptoms, and they'll likely fade in a day or two as well, since everyone except Jirou has little or no issue for their last two days most of the time. Last night's comfort and relaxation has left all the girls feeling better about life in general, actually, and they're all functional enough not to have to hide away in their rooms all day, so they decide collectively to go hang out outside, and spend the day confiscating incriminating photos and getting petty revenge on Kaminari and his stupidity. It's a good day.

Midoriya stays behind and cleans up the common room, Todoroki joining him when he wakes shortly after the others have disappeared. They don't talk much; there's not really any need. When they're done, they both decide that more sleep is not a terrible idea, but also they kind of want to watch more movies, since their attention last night was mostly on getting the girls what they needed (Midoriya) and making sure the temperature was right and the heat was moving the way it was supposed to (Todoroki) to actually help. They turn on another remake, this time with just the two of them, a movie about a woman whose quirk allows her to attach status effects to objects so that when people touch them they receive that effect. She's spiteful and somewhat villainous and sends her younger cousin into a deep sleep out of jealousy until a boy from school steps in and uses his own quirk— the ability to cancel others' quirks by touching them— to free the cousin from the effect. The cousin then uses her own telekinesis quirk to help the boy subdue the woman until they're able to resolve the problem. It ends with a typical happily ever after and the boy and cousin get recommendations to a prestigious hero high school. Midoriya rants the entire time about better ways they could be using their quirks and Todoroki listens. It's a good day.

And if Midoriya spends that night brushing Yaomomo's hair while Tsu comforts Uraraka who's crying over the bubblegum pop they're listening to, that's fine.

He's just happy to help any way he can.

 **Where did this come from? Heck if I know. I just wanted to write a soft story about Izuku knowing how to take care of period stuff, because he has a freaking single mom. Why would she try to hide this stuff from him when he could help?**

 **It's ridiculously rambly because I mostly wrote it around 5 am when my brain decided that four hours of sleep was plenty and it was Waking Time, and because I've been doing a dumb and eating things that exacerbate my brain fog. But that's just college life, yo. You eat what you can. Even if it kills your grades.** **someone stahp me please**

 **Anyway, mostly this is me ranting and rambling to escape the crushing reality of finals next week because I'm going t and it's fine, I'm paying for college which means I can pay as many times as I need to pass the classes I need, it's just more hours working to get the money. That's not the end of the world.**

 **It's just. Still stressful. Even knowing that. Partly because I hate work. Especially fast food.**

 **Why does Midoriya somehow know exactly what each girl's needs are? Because he can. How does he know? Because plot. I guess. He just... recognizes signs he's seen in his mother. Or something.**

 **Still! Rambly thing, done. Idk where awkward heating pad Todoroki came from, it just kind of happened. Blame sleep deprivation. Slightly-more-awake me finds something disturbing about his sister using him as an object in the little time they have together but also I have toddler siblings and lemme tell you, best. Heating pads. Ever. Cold in winter? Snuggle a toddler. Have a fever? Cuddle the toddler who brought the sickness home. Got out of the pool and haven't gotten to change since you got home? Take the toddler who likes being wet and squish with arms until satisfied. They're cute, they're warm, they're often giggly. Toddlers are a near-guaranteed way to feel better in 6.3 seconds flat. Warning: overexposure may have opposite effect.**

 **Why did teenage Shouto do the same thing?**

 **Uhhh... because it was five in the morning when I wrote it?**

 **Idk man, it just kind of came out. I cannot be held responsible for the writings of Sleepy Rick; that guy sometimes pumps out poetry and sometimes starts rambling about**

" _ **only those who experience the absolute mopping can balance nk and then if you're not ready you can't do it. Say there's a really tall kid who wants to play got the disadvantage from what it's got a batt hea Inly those who haven't attempted dto gain or discover any knill in an animreJust like Harrision Bergeron, he sent sjnd"**_

 **(actual quote from a sleep-deprived essay. Copied and pasted.)**

 **In fact, it's only like 8:30 but i think im just going to go to bed now before my actions can catch up with me for the rest of the day. I guess im secretly sleep deprived rick all along.**

 **This is just a dumb thing. I don't know why i wrote it, but i did. And i kind of like it. So imma post it.**

 **I'll probably take it down tomorrow unless people actually care about it or something. Or I forget. Whatever. Etiehr works.**

 **Oh, before I forget, the movies:**

 **-Emperor's New Groove**

 **-Mulan**

 **-Snow White**

 **-Sleeping Beauty**

 **Because I thought to myself, Disney is doing the remake thing. In another hundred years, Disney will probably do the remake thing again. What would the remake thing look like after enough time has passed for there to have been at least nine generations since the first quirks began to appear? What would the remake thing look like in a world with quirks at all?**

 **And thus was born the movies mentioned above.**

 **That's all. I know the ending is weak, but so am i. Good night all.**

 **~Rick**


End file.
